England can smile again after taking their first home victory of the summer against the West Indies at Lord's. Batting the side home, Cook and Bell provided England with the partnership required to chaise down 191 runs on day five, but not before the Windies demanded Jonny Bairstow's presence at the crease with England on 189 after Alistair Cook opened the bat looking for glory, but instead finding the hands of Kirk Edwards. Despite the score sheet now reading 1-0 to England, the West Indies can take away a wealth of positives from their performance at Lord's. Shiv Chanderpaul showed off his class, forcing the game to extend to five days, and should have been rewarded with his name on the Lord's honors board. His trademark anti-reflective strips, worn on his cheek bones, appeared like facial war-paint, as he ground England's bowling attack to a halt. "The war will be over by Christmas" they cried in 1914, that phrase coming to mind late on day three when Surrey announced their free entry policy for Lord's ticket holders the following day. Isn't hindsight a wonderful thing?
The West Indies would have felt they could have done better than their 243-all out in the first innings, allowing England to take early domination of the game. The atmosphere in the ground on day one was electric as the crowd rose from their seats to congratulate Broad's five-fore. What a bowler Broad is, nearly left out of the side this time last year, he has well and truly silenced all critics. Now his name is eternalised on all three honors boards, a test match 100, 5-wicket haul and a 10-wicket haul. Broady is England's all rounder, no question. England's first innings finally put an end to the run drought which has plagued the side over the winter. Strauss smashed 100, whilst Ian Bell batted back into form with 61 off 105 balls. Through the innings raised yet another question about Strauss' batting, he is still unable to convert an overnight 100 into a double hundred, the runs have silenced his critics...at least for now.
This test match also threw up questions to cricket's future and its morals. Where were key West Indian's like Chris Gayle? Knocking hundreds for IPL teams rather than representing their country at the home of the cricket. Why do we now live in a generation where domestic league cricket becomes bigger than representing your country at a test match? Everyone knows that, if they too were in Gayle's position they would take the money and the IPL season, but players should not be put into a situation where they have too choose money over playing international cricket. The ICC should not be allowing the IPL to get bigger than playing test cricket with the national team. The IPL teams are engineered each year, dictated to by dollar signs, and should not make players compromise their international duties. These types of competitions are doing nothing for the future of test cricket or the development of young players and their dominance and importance should be culled and controlled by the ICC, before a situation like the English Premier League develops, where individual clubs are bigger than the national team. I sincerely hope that the ECB take a different approach to improving domestic cricket and don't follow the advertising, money monster that is the Indian Premier League.
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| Stuart Broad who took an 11-wicket haul in the match |
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| Shiv Chanderpaul, number one batsman in the world with his trademark anti-reflective strips |
It is disappointing that you would suggest the IPL to be damaging to the game. Considering your prod at the Premier League, it is important to explain why the IPL will benefit cricket as a whole, and that is the improved quality of cricket it brings about. With more money, comes better players. If you put more money into something, it will grow. Unfortunately, that is at a loss to international cricket yes, but for cricket as a whole? Most certainly not.
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